PERNETY, Antoine Joseph

The History of a Voyage to the Malouine (or Falkland) Islands...

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T. Jefferys, London, 1771. Quarto, 16 engraved plates and maps (six of them folding); early ms. marginal annotations throughout, plates X and XIV with early repairs, some waterstaining, but a good copy in later half calf. A good copy of the first English edition. Pernety describes the voyage of Louis de Bougainville - which Bougainville funded himself - to the Falkland Islands, which he renamed the Malouines in honour of the sailors of St Malo. Pernety, whose account is extremely readable, was a Benedictine monk who proved a good chronicler of the voyage with a particular eye for natural history. His description was first published in French in 1769.

Bougainville set out to create a French colony but had to abandon his attempt in the face of Spanish opposition. Pernety's book gives a good account of the geography and the events, and particularly the natural history observations he made along the way, but is also of special interest for its extensive summary of the question of the Patagonian giants, a byway of Pacific myth and history that proved to be of lasting interest through the ages. Some of the most interesting components of the myth were perpetuated by English sailors on the Anson expedition. There is plenty of good material in Pernety's book on the Strait of Magellan.

This copy originally belonged to Mathew Maty, and has his signature on the title and many neat annotations in the margins in ink in his hand. Maty (1718-1776) was a physician, writer and chief librarian of the British Museum, and secretary of the Royal Society at about the time of publication of Pernety's book. Dr Johnson hated him ('The little black dog! I'd throw him into the Thames first' was his reaction to a suggestion that Maty help him in his review of English literature). Everyone else seemed to like him: he was a serious doctor, an early advocate of inoculation (experimenting on himself when necessary) and an influential figure in both scientific and literary London.
Borba de Moraes, II, 663; Hill, 1328; James Ford Bell, P176; Palau, 22256.

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